Daniil Medvedev will contest the 2024 Australian Open final on Sunday after beating Alexander Zverev in five sets.
The Semi-final day at the Australian Open was expected to be a long tennis day with a lot of great tennis, and it was, with the first match going to four sets and the second match ending in the fifth set.
Jannik Sinner first stunned Novak Djokovic in four sets to make the final, and then the two old rivals made it all the way to the fifth set. When it came to the second semi-final, Zverev dominated the matchup with his serve early on.
It wasn't the serving performance we saw against Carlos Alcaraz, but it was still more than good enough against Medvedev in the opening two sets. The Russian didn't play well in the first two sets, especially since his serve wasn't that great for much of it.
That was the major problem in the opening set, as he served very poorly, giving Zverev too many looks. He was down 1-4 and then 3-5 but battled back to 5-5. Unfortunately for Medvedev, due to the shaky serve, Zverev got another chance and, this time, used it to take the opening set 7-5.
Like the match against Alcaraz, Zverev flourished after taking the opening set, playing a tremendous second set to win it 6-3. He outplayed Medvedev, who served better this time around but still could have been better.
The third set was by far Medvedev's best as he played more relaxed, and the serve worked better. The third set was finished in a pretty close tiebreak that Medvedev won 7-4.
It was the crowning moment of his best set of tennis that day. The fourth set was pretty similar as Medvedev cruised again through his games while giving Zverev some trouble on his serve.
He didn't find a breakthrough, so it ended up in another tiebreak. Zverev was up 5-4 with two serves, but he lost both of them to give Medvedev a set point, which he converted with an ace.
The final set continued to show Medvedev slowly taking over the match as Zverev grew increasingly nervous and started to miss more. Eventually, Medvedev got the break and finished things off with a great comeback. He won after over 4 hours with the final score being 5-7 3-6 7-6(4) 7-6(5) 6-3.
Daniil Medvedev vs Alexander Zverev Match Stats:
| Daniil Medvedev | 5-7 3-6 7-6(4) 7-6(5) 6-3 | Alexander Zverev |
| 14 | Aces | 14 |
| 6 | Double Faults | 1 |
| 60% | First Serve % | 78% |
| 77% (72/94) | Points Won After First Serve % | 71% (94/132) |
| 56% (35/62) | Points Won After Second Serve % | 58% (22/38) |
| 29% (4/14) | Break Point Conversion | 50% (5/10) |
| 52 | Winners | 66 |
| 41 | Unforced Errors | 70 |
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